Date post: | 22-Apr-2015 |
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Technology |
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Open Source in Local Government
Tim Willoughby
LGMA
Context
• Local Authority Termination of Microsoft Enterprise Agreement
• Potential for Open Source Across the Sector• Open Source Applications already in Use
Currently See 5 Themes
• Desktop Application Replacement• Content Management System• Document Management• GIS• Back Office
• Telephony• BI• Development (Traditional, Apps)
What Are LGMA Doing ?
• Open Source Workshops• Open Mind
• Open Source RFI• Inventory of Skills and Abilities
• 5 Category areas• CMS• Doc Management / Case / CRM• GIS• Back Office• Desktop Applications
Met with
• Accenture
• Acquia (Drupal)
• Alfresco
• Azucca
• Cloudware
• Compass Informatics
• Digital Alchemy
• Digital Technology Mgmt
• Dublin City of Science
• eDocs
• Enovation
• iOl
• IBM
• IMGS
• Indytech
• Infinity (Asterix)
• Interleaf
• Kerna
• LERO
• MAC
• Maithu
• Mentea
• Microsoft
• Newgrove
• OHanlonO’Dowd
• Open Source Solutions
• PMI
• Propylon
• Provident Technology
• pTools• Sage• SecureLinux• SinglePoint• Sirius• Sord• SpanishPoint• Tara Hill• Tascomi• Titan• Triangle
Local Authority Support
• CMS (Drupal)• Cork, Fingal, Wicklow, South Dublin, Limerick City, LGMA….
• Doc Management / Case / CRM (Alfresco, Sugar, vTiger)• Meath, Leitrim, South Dublin, Cork County
• GIS (Open Layers, Map Server)• LGMA, Kildare, All
• Back Office (PF Sense, MySQL, PostGres, PostMail, Zarafa, etc)• Limerick City, South Dublin, Cork County, Fingal
• Desktop Applications (Libre Office, OpenProj, etc)• Galway City, Cork City, Limerick City, Cork County, Libraries
Everyone else is using Open source…..
• More than half of all web servers (>91 million) run Apache (September, 2010)
• ~2.5 million total Alfresco downloads (Alfresco, 2010)
• 2 million Drupal downloads last year (2010)
• 2.5 million articles (in English alone) on wikipedia, the world's 8th busiest web site according to Alexa (2010)
• 6 million blogs hosted on wordpress.com which Alexa ranks as #28 (2010)
• Drupal and Joomla web sites handle more traffic than 17 of the Fortune 20 corporate sites (Burton Group, 2008)OS
Database
Web/App Server
Developer Tools
Applications
Cloud/SAAS
Ope
n So
urce
Understand the French Definition of Gratis v Libre
The Dual Open Source Approach
• This approach offers the most potential to Local Government.• There are certain products in the Open Source Arena that follow the Dual
Approach• Alfresco - Web Site Development and Presentation• eGroupware - Mail / Calendar / Contacts / Helpdesk• SugarCRM – CRM application• MySQL• ... And many more
• Each of these solutions offer an Enterprise Application which costs similar or in the case of CRM more than the equivalent proprietary product
• Each also offer a Community product which has no cost for the license, however, the costs for support, maintenance and bug fixes can be very high.
• The only way to counteract this cost Risk is to become an active part of the community or share the risk across the whole Local Government Community
Why Consider Alternatives for Office Automation
• Ease of access• Ability to collaborate• Open Platform (PC, Mac & Linux
Compatibility)• Open Standard - Open Document Format -• Cost! MS Office 2007 / 2010 is €149 - €550
per license.
Open Source Research and Learning to date
• The Open Source Community is out there• There are Many, Many Open Source solutions• Open Source Successful projects are based around
communities.• The route to success for Local Authorities is to mimic the
Open Source Community model• There is an Opportunity now to look to adopt Open Source
License
• There are upward of 71 open source licenses which fall into 3 families:
• Give me credit• Give me fixes• Give me everything
• We do have to understand the differences and the potentials.
•Low cost and scalable infrastructure (Linux, MySQL, Apache)•Quality software available at no licenses cost•Key software components available for integration•Can make changes to Open source code for extra value•Development and run time environments for fast and iterative deployments (PHP, Perl, Python, Ruby on Rails)•Communities for instant help and fast innovation cycles•Open Source as a Engine for Web 2.0
Open Source Lowering Barriers for Entrants
What is Open Source
What is Open Source
In other words.. All technologies
Why Open Source?
•Insist on Open Standards - Increases Agility - flexibility and responsiveness Evaluate Open Source and Commercial software options•Can use a mixture of open source and proprietary•Don’t need a separate Strategy— interoperability I migration considerations are important•Like all Software Solutions – have to Balance up-front costs against recurring costs
How to Integrate Open Source into our IT strategy
What do we have to do?
• Understand the Community and Maturity of Open Source - Broad industry support are important
• Sustainable business models are critical• Healthy ecosystem of Solution Providers and Business Partners
essential• Establish policies for working with Open Source software• Educate company teams about OSS before they work with it• Implement a management system to review, approve, and track the
use of OSS inside the company, and contributions of company software assets to external OSS projects
• Understand Open Source Licensing – need to establish a process to help us understand the terms of the licenses and the procedures required to comply with them
• Make decisions based on both business and technical factors
Open Source attitudes and expectations…
Time
Technology
Capabilities
Trying to keep upTrying to changeStruggling
Given upGoing to die
ExistingWorkforce
TechnologyNew Entrants
Pushing limitsExperimentingDemandingExploringUse any tool
•Pavement Management System / MapRoad
•Open Layers
•PostGres
•Open Street Map
•Pavement Management System / MapRoad
•Open Layers
•PostGres
•Open Street Map
Open source in LGCSB
Map Data•Aerial Photography•MapRoads Road Networks•OpenStreeMapping•Routes, WPIs, Road Programmes
Integration of new OSi Web Services
Time slider control to view Work Programme Items and Routes for a limited range of years
Work Programme Items by Type and by Phase
The World is changing
What are Other Governments doing?
• The UK Government has agreed to:• consider Open source solutions alongside proprietary ones in IT
procurements. Contracts will be awarded on a value for money basis
• only use products for interoperability that support open standards and specifications in all future IT developments
• seek to avoid lock-in to proprietary IT products and services.• Reasons –
• 1. Cost Savings - Licensing Fees• 2. Solutions vs Software• 3. Speed to Deployment• 4. Cost Savings - IT Investments• 5. Open Source Standards & Security
Bristol City
Conclusions
Can be fanatic or a zealot, but the show must go on
A growing number of OSS Government communities across Europe
Every migration to Open Source Software needs a change
programme and TCO to justify it
OSS need not be an all or nothing scenario nor the universal answer
to IT future
The higher the dependence on proprietary office productivity
software the bigger the task to move to OSS
Need to overcome the support issue